Tiny lane delayed fire fighting operation
December 10th, 2011 - 12:22 am ICT by IANSKolkata, Dec 9 (IANS) The tiny lane leading to the AMRI Hospital annexe building proved a major hindrance in the firefighting operation as the fire tenders found it difficult to negotiate the narrow stretch.
As the vehicles got stranded, precious time was lost in saving lives, mainly of patients in the South Kolkata hospital.
“The Annexe-1 block has been constructed in a tiny lane. We will conduct an enquiry to find out whether the construction was legal,” said West Bengal Municipal Affairs Minister Firhad Hakim.
Retired IPS officer Sandhi Mukherjee, who earlier had worked as city police deputy commissioner (traffic), said: “This is the only hospital in the city situated in such a narrow lane.”
The main building of the hospital is located to the east of the Dhakuria Bridge on Gariahat Road. The road between the hospital and the bridge is itself quite narrow.
However, to reach the ill-fated annexe building, one has to cross the main building, turn left into a narrow lane - called Panchnaantala Road. The lane ends in the two annexe buildings. While the one that caught fire was constructed in 2005, the second started operations only in September.
The hospital was co-founded by the Emami & Shrachi Groups along with the West Bengal government in 1996. The blaze in the annexe building led to 88 deaths.
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Tags: affairs minister, blaze, bridge, city police, deaths, deputy commissioner, enquiry, fire tenders, firefighting, hakim, hindrance, municipal affairs, narrow stretch, precious time, traffic, west bengal government